Reading The Lightning Thief
by araguru getsuga
Summary: The Greek demigods and the Egyptian magicians meet for the first time and they read the Percy Jackson series and the Kane Chronicles together.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything! Rick Riordan owns everything related to Percy Jackson or the Kane Chronicles.  
**

* * *

**At Camp Half-Blood…**

Annabeth was sitting near the lake at Camp Half-Blood, worrying sick about Percy.

"Where are you, Percy?" she asked.

Suddenly, a bright light enveloped her and a few others as well.

**At the 21****st**** Nome…**

Carter and Sadie were sitting around bored.

"What do you want to do today?" Sadie asked.

"I don't know. The only thing I'm hoping is that nothing weird is going to happen." Carter said before the same light enveloped him and his sister.

**At Olympus…**

The arguments were always the normal routine.

"Mother Rhea likes you the most!"

"Air natural disasters cause more damage than sea disasters!"

"Stop telling everyone to eat cereal, Demeter!"

"Hades, you need more cereal!"

"Give me back my sword!"

"Stop flirting with my Hunters!"

"Stop flirting with those women!"

"Stop yelling at me, sissy!"

"If you keep stressing out, you'll make me ugly!"

"When are you going to apologize for throwing me off Olympus?"

"Stop going near Athens, Kelp Head!"

"Please stop letting me go to that wretched camp!"

"_Does anyone have any rats?"_

"_Stop asking that question, George!"_

"Would you two please shut up?!"

Well, that _was_ the normal routine until two bright lights appeared.

"What in Hades is going on?" Annabeth asked.

"You're not the only one." Nico said.  
"Nico, and Thalia?" Annabeth asked.

Another bright light appeared, and revealed more demigods.

Jason, Piper, Leo, Clarisse, Chris Rodriguez, Travis and Connor Stoll, and Katie Gardner appeared and were standing next to Thalia.

"Where are we?" Jason asked.

"I think we're on Olympus." Clarisse said.

On the opposite side of the room, a bright light appeared and revealed strangers.

Carter, Sadie, Walt, Julian, and Alyssa appeared from the light as it was disappearing.

"Looks like you were wrong again. Some weird light picked us up and dropped us somewhere we don't know." Sadie said.

"Who are they?" Julian asked.

Annabeth and the demigods from Camp Half-Blood bowed.

"Why are they here and who are they?" Zeus asked.

"Okay. Let's introduce ourselves first then figure out the whole scenario." Nico said.

"Annabeth Chase, daughter of Athena, and architect of Olympus." Annabeth said.

"That's impossible. You should be 9!" Athena said.

Before anything else could be said, Thalia dropped into the conversation.

"Thalia Grace, daughter of Zeus, and lieutenant of the Hunters of Artemis." She said.

"You should be a tree!" Zeus said.

"Nico, son of Hades." Nico said.

Zeus got angry.

"I was born before the oath and placed in the Lotus Hotel and Casino." He added.

"Why didn't you kill him?" Zeus asked Hades.

"What would you do if I told you to kill your own daughter?" Hades countered.

That stopped Zeus from talking.

"Jason Grace, son of Jupiter." Jason said.

"Why is a Roman here?" Athena asked.

"The future is weird and complicated." he answered.

"Piper, daughter of Aphrodite." a girl said.

"Leo, son of Hephaestus." a boy said.

"Clarisse, daughter of Ares." Clarisse said.

Ares smiled at her.

"Chris Rodriguez, Travis and Connor Stoll, sons of Hermes." they said.

Hermes smiled with pride.

"Katie Gardner, daughter of Demeter." Katie said.

"Carter Kane. In case you don't know, we don't have demigods in Egypt." Carter said.

Everyone except the people next to Carter were shocked.

"Sadie Kane. I'm Carter's little sister." Sadie said.

"Walt Stone. I'm Sadie's friend." Walt said.

"Julian and Alyssa. We're friends of Carter and Sadie." they said.

Another bright light appeared. After it disappeared on the floor were 8 books with a note.

Poseidon picked it up and read it.

_"Dear demigods and the ones associated to Egypt. We thought that this would be a fun way to let the two groups meet. 5 of the books are about the demigods and 3 are the ones associated with Egypt. Please **DO NOT WHATSOEVER **do anything that would change the future for the worst._

_From,_

_Hermes and Apollo._

_P.S. There might be someone unexpected coming, so be prepared."_

Jason grabbed the first book titled Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief.

"Who wants to read?" he asked.

"I will." Nico answered.

He cleared his throat and started reading.

* * *

**A/N: This is just the prologue and it took me a long time to do it. Well, review, please. I'll hopefully see you next chapter or not forever.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything! Rick Riordan owns everything related to Percy Jackson and the Kane Chronicles.  
**

**Sorry to keep the people waiting for the second chapter. The Internet kept going whacko, so I wasn't able to update. **

**Then I found out about my leg having a badly pulled muscle that hasn't been diagnosed yet.**

**Again I'm sorry and enjoy the chapter.**

* * *

**"I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher" **Nico read.

"Is every chapter going to start like that?" Jason asked.

"Knowing Percy, then the answer is yes." Thalia said.

**Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.**

"We all didn't!" all the half-bloods said.

"What's a half-blood?" the magicians asked.

"It'll explain in the book." Annabeth said.

**If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is:**

"Oh no, he's going to give an advice!" Thalia said sarcastically.

"This might not end well." Nico said.

**close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.**

"Not bad, Seaweed Brain. Not bad." Annabeth said.

"Seaweed Brain?" Sadie asked.

"It's a nickname that Annabeth gave Percy a long time." Nico said.

**Being a half-blood is dangerous.**

"Check." Nico said.

**It's scary.**

"Check." Nico said.

**Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.**

"Double check." Nico said.

**If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.**

**But if you recognize yourself in these pages-if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you.**

**Don't say I didn't warn you.**

"You didn't." Apollo said.

**My name is Percy Jackson.**

**I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.**

**Am I a troubled kid?**

"YES!" the demigods yelled.

"He's probably not that troubled as Carter." Sadie said.

"I'm not a troubled kid!" Carter protested.

**Yeah. You could say that.**

Everybody laughed.

"He even admits it!" Nico commented.

**I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan- twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.**

"That sounds like torture." Poseidon said.

Athena looked horrified at Poseidon's comment, but happy that it's about Greek and Roman.

**I know-it sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were. **

"Like father, like son." Hermes said.

**But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.  
**

**Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to** **sleep. **

"Sounds like Chiron." Thalia said.

"He falls asleep in class?!" Athena asked.

"That's my kind of teacher." Hermes said.

**I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.  
**

**Boy, was I wrong.**

"Of course, Percy." Thalia said.

**See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind- the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.**

Everyone burst out laughing.

"Awesome!" Hermes said.

"I wanted to hear more." Apollo whined.

**This trip, I was determined to be good.**

"This is not going to end well." Nico said.

**All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.**

"EEW!" Aphrodite exclaimed.

"I like peanut butter, but not that combination." Apollo said.

"Idiot." Artemis said.

"You love us." Apollo said.

"Do you want an arrow through that pea-sized brain head of yours, or not?" Artemis asked.

Apollo gulped.

Suddenly a bright light appeared.

Standing there was Grover and Will Solace.

"Where am I?" they asked.

"On Olympus." Annabeth said and told them everything that happened.

They went over and sat down to listen to the story.

**Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

"Way to blow your cover." Thalia said.

**Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.**

"That's bad." Carter said.

"Not as bad as the trouble he's about to get himself into." Annabeth said.

"What trouble?" Jason asked.

"I'm not going to spoil it." Annabeth said.

**"I'm going to kill her, " I mumbled.**

**Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter. "**

**He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.**

**"That's it. " I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.**

**"You're already on probation, " he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens. "**

**Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.**

"Of course it wouldn't!" Annabeth and Grover said.

**Mr. Brunner led the museum tour. **

**He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.**

**It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.**

"Longer by about 2000 years." Athena said.

**He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone col-umn with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of inter-esting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.**

"Clue 1." Nico said.

"What do you mean, Clue 1?" Carter said.

"Exactly what it sounds like. Clue number 1." Thalia said.

"To what?" Walt asked.

"I'm not spoiling anything." Thalia said.

**Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous** breakdown.

_"Why is my Fury there?" Hades thought._

**From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey, " real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.**

_"Why does that sound familiar?" Nico thought._

**One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right. "**

"Clue number 2." Nico said.

**Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art. **

**Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you shut up?" **

**It came out louder than I meant it to.**

"Of course. That was expected." Thalia said,

**The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story. **

**"Mr. Jackson, " he said, "did you have a comment?"**

**My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir. "**

**Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"**

**I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"**

The older gods grimaced.

"Out of all the pictures, it had to be that one." Zeus said.

**"Yes, " Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because ... "**

**"Well... " I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-"**

"GOD?!" the gods yelled.

"Chiron will correct him." Thalia said.

"For the Egyptians' information, this is centered around Greek mythology." Annabeth said.

The magicians just nodded.

**"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

"See?" Thalia said.

**"Titan, " I corrected myself. "And ... He didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters-"**

"EEW!" Aphrodite exclaimed.

**"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

"-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans, " I continued, "and the gods won. "

**Some snickers from the group.**

"He got the myth correct, so why are they laughing?" Nico said.

"I have no idea." Annabeth said.

**Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids."**

**"And why, Mr. Jackson, " Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"**

"He's dead." Apollo and Hermes said.

**"Busted, " Grover muttered.**

**"Shut up, " Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair. **

**At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.**

"He was observant for once." Annabeth said.

**I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir. "**

**"I see. " Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

**The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses. **

"Boys." Artemis said with disdain.

**Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."**

**I knew that was coming.**

"What's coming?" Jason asked.

"We'll find out soon." Nico said.

**I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

**Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go- intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything. **

"Observant again." Annabeth said.

**"You must learn the answer to my question, " Mr. Brunner told me.**

**"About the Titans?"**

**"About real life. And how your studies apply to it. "**

"Back then he didn't know that it would actually help him nowadays." Annabeth said.

**"Oh. "**

"The smart answer that Percy always gives out." Thalia said.

**"What you learn from me, " he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."**

"That's true." Nico said.

** I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

"For a good reason too, Seaweed Brain." Annabeth said.

**I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshiped.**

"That's so cool." Carter said.

"My kind of teacher." Hermes said.

**But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life.**

Athena looked horrified.

**No, he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.**

"True on the spelling part." Annabeth said.

**I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.**

"Probably had." Nico and Hades said.

**He told me to go outside and eat my lunch. **

**The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.**

**Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.  
**

Everyone looked at Zeus and Poseidon with suspicion.

**Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing. **

**Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school-the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere. **

Grover shrugged.

**"Detention?" Grover asked.**

"Is detention that common for him?" Piper asked.

"Every school that he went to, he always had a bunch of detentions in the end." Annabeth said.

"All are from the school." Thalia said.

"The other things are suspension and being expelled because of something weird and him destroying the school." Nico said.

Everyone except some of the demigods, Grover, and the gods had their eyes wide with shock.

**"Nah, " I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean-I'm not a genius. "**

"I'll give you one percent credit for that." Thalia said.

"He's an idiot ninety-nine percent of the time." Annabeth said.

"The other one percent is when he is smart." Nico said.

Most looked shocked.

**Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

Everyone laughed.

**I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

"Good thing, too." Grover said.

**I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.**

"Softie." Ares said.

Aphrodite glared at him.

**Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table. **

Hephaestus started thinking on the mechanics of the wheelchair.

**I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends-I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists-and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.**

"EEW!" Aphrodite shrieked.

**"Oops. " She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray- painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

"Give her a make over!" Aphrodite yelled.

** I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper."**

"Never works." Will said.

**But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears. **

"A wave?" the magicians and the newer demigods asked.

**I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"**

**Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us. **

**Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-"**

**"-the water-"**

**"-like it grabbed her-"**

"POSEIDON!" Zeus yelled.

"Okay. Fine. That's my son." Poseidon said, raising his hands in surrender.

Zeus was about to grab his lightning bolt.

"We can't do anything to change the future anyway, so my son is spared." Poseidon said.

Zeus scowled at Poseidon.

**I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

"Of course you got in trouble!" the demigods yelled except for Piper, Jason, and Leo.

**As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc. , etc. , Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester.**

"That was probably true." Nico said.

**"Now, honey-"**

"Not with the honey thing again!" the demigods yelled.

"Is the honey thing that annoying?" Julian asked.

"Yes, it's annoying." Grover said.

**"I know, " I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks. **

"NEVER GUESS YOUR PUNISHMENT!" the Hermes kids and Hermes yelled.

"That's violation of Rule Number 6." Travis said.

"You have rules?" everyone asked.

The Hermes kids nodded.

**That wasn't the right thing to say.**

"Of course it wasn't!" the Hermes kids said.

**"Come with me, " Mrs. Dodds said.**

** "Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her. "**

** I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death. **

"She did." Grover said.

** She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

**"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood, " she said.**

**"But-"**

**"You-will-stay-here. "**

** Grover looked at me desperately.**

**"It's okay, man, " I told him. "Thanks for trying. "**

"That was brave of you to stand up for him like that." Carter said.

"Percy was grateful that you did that." Annabeth said.

"Clue number 3." Nico muttered.

**"Honey, " Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "Now. "**

"What's going to happen? I don't think it's going to end well." Walt said.

"Technically, nothing ends well for Percy." Thalia said.

** Nancy Bobofit smirked. **

"I am going to kill her." Nico said.

**I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare.**

Everyone that received the glare shuddered.

"It can't be that bad." Piper said.

"If you haven't seen it, then you don't know it." Nico said.

**Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.**

** How'd she get there so fast?**

"Clue number 4." Nico said.

**I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.**

"I don't think so, punk." Clarisse said.

"He's still affected by the Mist, right?" Annabeth asked.

Grover nodded.

"What's the Mist?" Julian asked.

"I'll tell you if it isn't explained.

**I wasn't so sure.**

"Of course." Will said.

**I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

**Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.**

"Really, Chiron?!" Every demigod yelled except for the magicians, Jason, Piper, and Leo.

"Are those two the same thing?" Alyssa asked.

"Same person." Grover said.

**I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.**

**Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop. But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

"When you know Percy, you always know that things never go in his way." Thalia said.

Poseidon starts to get pale.

**I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.**

**Except for us, the gallery was empty.**

"Typical. Monsters don't want interference." Nico said.

**Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**

"Clue number-" Nico started.

"Oh, forget it." Thalia said.

**Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially ****Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...**

"Probably would." Grover said.

**"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

"Enough with the honey thing!" Everyone yelled.

**I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

"That's the first time he did the safe thing." Annabeth said.

**She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"**

"Get away with what?" the magicians, the new demigods, and the gods asked.

**The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

**She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me. I said, "I'll—I'll try harder, ma'am."**

**Thunder shook the building.**

The demigods looked at Zeus.

"Really?" Thalia asked.

Zeus shrugged.

** "We are not fools, Percy Jackson, " Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain. "**

"I doubted that even if he knew about it and confessed, he would still get himself killed." Nico said.

**I didn't know what she was talking about.**

**All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room.**

"Awesome!" the Hermes kids and Hermes yelled.

**Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book. **

Athena and Annabeth were horrified.

**"Well?" she demanded. **

**"Ma'am, I don't... "**

** "Your time is up, " she hissed.**

**Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

"YOU SENT A FURY AFTER HIM?!" Every demigod and Poseidon yelled at Hades.

"What's a Fury?" the magicians asked.

"Hades' torturers. They live in the Underworld and tortures evil souls in the Fields of Punishment." Grover said.

**Then things got even stranger.**

**Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

**"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.**

"What's a pen going to do?" Leo asked.

Most people had the same question.

**Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

**With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword-Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.**

"So the pen is actually a sword?" Jason asked.

"Yeah." Grover said.

Annabeth realized that Percy was holding Riptide.

**Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.**

**My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

"Wimp." Clarisse and Ares said.

**She snarled, "Die, honey!"**

"ENOUGH WITH THE HONEY THING!" Everyone yelled due to their annoyance.

**And she flew straight at me.**

**Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

"Naturally?" Carter asked.

"Battle reflexes." Will said.

The magicians looked at him confused.

"It will explain." Will said.

**The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. Hisss!**

"He compares everything to water." Nico said.

"Almost everything." Thalia corrected him.

**Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me. **

Everyone shivered.

**I was alone.**

**There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.  


**My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.**

"He's still letting the the Mist affect him." Thalia said.

**Had I imagined the whole thing?**

"No." Annabeth said.

**I went back outside. **

**It had started to rain. **

**Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt. "**

"Who?" Poseidon asked.

** I said, "Who?"**

"Again, like father like son." Apollo said.

** "Our teacher. Duh!"**

I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.  


**She just rolled her eyes and turned away.**

**I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

He said, "Who?"

**But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

"You need to learn from us." Connor said.

"No thank you." Grover said.

**"Not funny, man, " I told him. "This is serious. "**

Thunder boomed overhead.

"What is up with you, dad?" Thalia and Jason asked.

Zeus shrugged.

**I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, read-ing his book, as if he'd never moved.**

I went over to him.

He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson. "

I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.  


**"Sir, " I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

**He stared at me blankly. "Who?"**

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher. "

He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"

"Now Chiron's a good liar." Hermes said.

"That's all. Who's next?" Nico asked.

"I will." Hermes said

* * *

**A/N: FINALLY DONE! This chapter took a long time. Review and hopefully I'll see you in the next chapter. Or not. Bye!**


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